


Alien Abduction

by elisi



Series: Not the Last [5]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Doctor Who AU, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-23
Updated: 2011-02-24
Packaged: 2017-11-08 23:25:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 17,475
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/448722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elisi/pseuds/elisi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This story begins with abduction and ends with waffles. In between there's some adventuring and some heartache and a fair few truths are revealed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

_August 2023_

The Doctor and the Master were woken at the precise same moment by a piercing mental scream.

_‘Dad!’_

They met by the TARDIS console, eyes wide and terrified, speaking without words.

_‘Did you hear it too?’_

_‘Yes.’_

Where was he - their boy? In a second the Doctor had dialled Jack’s number, both of them listening impatiently while it rang.

The Seeker had decided that he wanted to go camping with his two best friends over the summer holidays, and had somehow - despite the fact that they were all just barely sixteen - been granted permission. Jack had offered to help out since he knew plenty of interesting spots around Wales, and so acted as chauffeur when they wanted to move on.

Finally Jack picked up his phone, but his complaints about being woken at 3 am were quickly silenced, as the Doctor asked where he had last dropped the boys off. And... had anything happened to the Rift?

There was a short pause - impossible to wait through - and then Jack was back with a negative reply: None of his equipment had registered anything. Nothing out of the ordinary at least, and certainly no Rift activity.

The Timelords breathed a sigh of relief, before demanding the co-ordinates for where the boys had settled for the night, which Jack swiftly rattled off.

“I’ll meet you there,” he finished, but - knowing that Jack only had a car for transport - the Doctor ignored this and rang off, before swiftly and carefully programming the TARDIS.

Seconds later he and the Master stood in a dark, grassy valley next to a bright orange tent - which was empty. Then Jack materialised next to them and the Doctor frowned... he distinctly remembered immobilising the teleportation unit, but that particular how and when were questions for another time.

Inspecting the tent, there was no sign of a struggle - just an absence where there had obviously only moments before been three boys; the sleeping bags were still warm.

They could also sense some background radiation which told them nothing.

The Doctor had a terrible, almost paralysing feeling of deja vu - of being nearly broken in half by loss and fear, combined with a rising anger... Looking up, he saw all this and more mirrored on the Master’s face. And it struck him that the other had never experienced this before, had never cared for anyone more than himself until the child had been born. How would he react?

The Master caught his eyes and finally spoke, voice toneless and tightly controlled.

“I will find them. I will get him back, and then I will kill Every. Last. One of them!”

The unspoken words hanging in the air: _‘And don’t you dare stop me!’_

The Doctor looked back, nodding almost imperceptibly, before replying.

“One thing at a time, Master.”

He turned to Jack, and saw him carefully loading his gun. When finished Jack looked up, his face a mask as he caught the Master’s eyes.

“Never thought I’d say this, but - you have _my_ vote, Mr Saxon.”

The Master silently acknowledged Jack’s words, and they all three walked back to the TARDIS, ready to tear the universe apart to find the one who had been stolen from them.


	2. Chapter 1

First there was a sudden and terrifying awakening, and if Matt had been able to scream he would have called for his mum... But even as he tried to open his mouth the whole world - himself included - disappeared in a bright, white light.

Next thing he knew he was lying on a floor - a rather hard floor. Slowly he tried to sit up and looked around. He was in a small room - 20 feet square he reckoned - floor, walls and ceiling all made out of the same pale grey faintly glowing material. There was a door in one of the walls - fitting flushly into the frame and with no handle. He could see Josh and Alex similarly try to get their bearings as they too sat up, and even as he tried to deny to himself what had clearly happened, Josh spoke up - voice as shaky as Matt felt:

“Oh god... We’ve been abducted.”

It wasn’t that everyone didn’t know that aliens existed or anything, but... Just like meeting a genuine movie star, seeing aliens - never mind being abducted - wasn’t something Matt had ever thought would happen to him.

As the reality sank in he could feel panic beginning to take over. This was it... he would never get home, never see his family again, and he would die some horrible death-

Then Alex let his head fall back against the wall, sighing deeply as he looked around.

“Oh great. Jack will _never_ let me live this down.”

Matt’s mounting panic suddenly stumbled, before turning incredulous.

“What? We’ve been abducted by aliens who will do goodness knows what to us, and you’re saying... _what_?”

Alex shot him a wry look. “Calm down Arthur Dent, things could be a lot worse!”

“ _Excuse_ me?” Josh exploded, clearly on the verge of breaking down. “How could things _possibly_ be worse? Please tell me that Alex, I’d _love_ to know!”

Alex smiled a little. “Well Earth could have been blown up and this could be a Vogon ship!”

Then frowning he slowly stood up, studying the room. Matt watched him as he stood there, in his stripy pyjama bottoms and grey Sex Pistols T-shirt, blond hair somewhat ruffled and head tilted the way Matt knew so well - meaning that Alex was trying to figure something out.

There were times when Matt wished that he wasn’t as smart as he was, and this was one of those times. Because in a sudden flash hundreds - _thousands_ \- of different memories fused together in one perfect whole - and even before Alex started talking Matt knew that his best friend wasn’t who he seemed.

“Actually... what kind of ship is this?” Alex bit his lip and tapped the wall. “Interior structure of luminous kartillium - simple, hard wearing... and used by lots of different species. Not helpful. Now...”

He walked over to the door and stared intently at the inscription above it, written in odd, strangely official looking, squiggles.

“OK, it looks like... Karth? No... they don’t have those glyphs... And not Anstoan either... Glattian? They have those dot-things... yes, and the dips in the secondary units... I think. Or is that the Nu-thenians?” He dragged a hand through his hair and sighed. “Guess this’ll teach me to do my homework and not plan out imaginary laboratories instead...”

Matt made up his mind and stood up; then said, voice as level as he could make it: “You’re an alien!”

Alex turned his head and shot him and Josh a dazzling smile, the one that was pure, unalloyed Saxon and always reminded Matt of Ford Prefect - it was just that little too wide and unnerving.

“Yes I am! I’ve been waiting for you to figure that out for _ages_ now!”

Then he turned back to the writing on the wall, absentmindedly turning the bracelet on his wrist round and round.

“Right... we’re in holding chamber 375... or possibly 1375, I can’t remember what that little squiggle means... on level 6 of a Glattian ship. And that symbol at the end is the official sign of the... 28th Dynasty - all of which means that we’re in our own time and if we’re lucky haven’t even left the solar system yet...” He smiled triumphantly, and then took in the way Matt had edged closer to Josh, both of them silently staring at him.

“What?”

“You’re an alien!”

“Yes, we covered that already.”

Matthew shook his head. “You’re our best friend and you’ve _lied_ to us. For _years_!”

Alex looked somewhat taken aback. “I didn’t _lie_ , I just... I just didn’t tell the whole truth.”

They both stared at him, incredulous. Josh found his voice first.

“I don’t _believe_ this. We don’t... we thought we _knew_ you, but now... Who - no, _what_ are you? Is Alex even your name? What... what do you really look like? Where do you come from - do you have some home planet somewhere that you report back to? Are we here because of _you_?”

“What? _No_!” Alex was staring at them, pained and angry, and clearly trying to hold himself back.

“I’m just... _me_! _This_ is what I look like and you’ve known me since I was 4 years old! Earth is my home, just the same way it is yours - I mean my mum’s human and all!”

“So... you’re half-human?” Josh asked, and Alex’s eyes widened in what looked like genuine horror.

“ _God_ no! I’ve not had a proper look at my genetic makeup - yet - but whatever part of me is human is infinitesimally small, bordering on non-existent, thankfully.”

He bit his lip. “Um, no offence?”

“Oh. Well it’s nice to know how you really feel about us.” Matt hadn’t meant to sound so snippy, but it was easier to be angry than take in all the implications of the situation.

“I didn’t mean it like... well, OK, I totally did, sorry, but you don’t understand...”

Alex stopped, and rubbed his face tiredly. He stood still for a moment, then looked up, a resigned - and yet somehow proud - look on his face.

“I’m a Timelord. I... I don’t have time to explain what that means, but my people - and their planet - were destroyed in a war long before I was born. The only survivors were my father and my uncle. I’ve - I’ve wanted to tell you for so long, but I wasn’t allowed. And I promise to tell you anything you want to know after we get home, yeah?”

Matt stared at him, his anger and incredulity suddenly overtaken by breathless hope. They could get home?

And then things slotted together again - his friend was an _alien_! What exactly was he capable of? With an internal sigh of relief he decided to fall back into old patterns - because Alex had always been the leader. Alex had the sharpest mind, the most expansive imagination, and was never flustered or nervous... He just seemed to float above everything, calm and capable...

And apparently this extended to places as weird and frightening as alien spaceships.

“You can get us home? How?”

Alex shrugged. “I’ll find a way. I mean we’ll be rescued sooner or later whatever happens - my family are probably already looking for us - if they heard me...” His voice trailed off, a little uncertain. “Anyway, they will come as soon as they realise I’m gone. But I’m not gonna sit around uselessly, waiting to be rescued like some third-rate Companion; so - let’s see what we can do.”

Josh’s face was a picture. “What we can do? In case you haven’t noticed the door doesn’t even have a handle!”

Alex turned to the door, and slowly stroked it. “Yeah, that’s a bit awkward. Hmm... Glattians, Glattians...”

Matt and Josh looked at each other. “So, Alex... what are these... Glattians?”

“Huh?” He shot them a look, then obviously realised that they didn’t have a clue.

“Oh - they’re...” he thought for a moment. “They’re a bit like Victorian explorers - running around the universe scooping up interesting stuff and taking it apart. Some of them are rather good to be honest, and some are blundering buffoons - some are both at the same time...”

“So we’re like... what... to them?”

Alex shrugged. “Curious life form to be explored. They took all three of us, so I’m guessing they’d use one of us to cut open, one to experiment on, and one to stick in a museum.”

Matt began to feel sick again, a terrified emptiness like he was falling and falling and he had to fight to focus on Alex and the fact that his friend didn’t seem bothered in the least.

Then Alex tilted his head, eyes narrowing as he turned to the door.

“What?”

Josh was looking at him, but Alex now had is ear pressed up to the door, eyes closed.

“Someone’s coming... _Sh!_ I need to concentrate.”

He frowned and kept completely still for a long while, before a tiny triumphant smile crept into the corner of his mouth.

“Yes... that’s it... come closer...”

Then with a silent ‘whoosh’ the door opened, and outside stood a tall, three eyed alien brandishing a scary looking weapon. Its skin was blue, and it wore some kind of uniform, with strange alien artifacts attached. Matt, without realising it, stepped backwards, until his back was against the wall. Josh was next to him, clearly as terrified.

A real alien... right there, all... _alien._ Three eyes and blue skin and _weapons_...

The fact that Alex had just been revealed to be non-human was suddenly much less of an issue.

But Alex’s smile never wavered as he looked straight into the creature’s eyes, before slowly moving aside so the alien could walk in.

Matt stared from the alien - a Glattian he presumed - to Alex, and swallowed somewhat nervously, as the blue creature made no sound.

“Have you... hypnotised him?”

Alex nodded, and Matt asked, looking back and forth. “So - you’re like Paul McKenna?”

Alex turned abruptly, the same look on his face the same as that time when Matt’s aunt Georgia had called him a mini Carol Vorderman.

“I’m _nothing_ like Paul McKenna!”

Then he quickly stepped out the door and the other two followed. They were in a long corridor with numerous doors along the walls and doors at the end. All doors were closed, probably locked. Alex sighed.

“More doors! If only Uncle would let me have my own screwdriver - but no, that might actually be _useful_!”

Josh shook his head. “What good would a screwdriver be?”

Alex turned, an impatient look on his face. “It’s a _sonic_ screwdriver! It can do all sorts of things, including opening doors like these.” He waved his hand. “It’s... an alien thing, OK?”

Then frowning he walked back into the small chamber and looked the alien over speculatively. “We’re gonna need codes and stuff to get out of this place, and it’ll take forever to work them out on an individual basis...” He swallowed and bit his lip, then looked from Matt to Josh.

“This is an emergency, right? So it’s OK to do... questionable... things, right?”

Matt nodded uncertainly, because he didn’t have a clue what Alex was talking about, but there was a look in his friend’s eyes that he didn’t like.

Alex obviously made up his mind, and took a deep breath. “OK. Here goes...”

Then carefully he put his fingertips on the Glattian’s temples and closed his eyes.

After a moment’s silence, in which Josh and Matt looked at each other, not sure what to do or say, Alex frowned.

“Jeez, these guy’s brains are like... upside down! Where is... ew! Wrong place! Wrong place! Oh wait... that’s... that’s it!”

For a while he stood completely still, concentrating, before letting go and stepping back, looking a little unsettled.

“Never done that before. Not allowed to, obviously, what with it being _way_ rude to go looking inside people’s heads, but since they _did_ abduct us... Still the- my uncle wouldn’t approve...”

Matt swallowed somewhat nervously, and realised that he and Josh were side-by-side again which felt comforting. Alex really, _really_ wasn’t anything like McKenna... Then the alien suddenly grunted a little, and Alex looked worried and stared at it intently, until it appeared frozen again.

“I’m not used to... controlling others... Not like this anyway. Not sure how long he’ll stay quiet if we leave him like this.”

Then a wicked little smile suddenly crossed his face, and he snatched the alien’s weapon up off the floor. Swiftly he looked it over, pressed a few buttons and made a row of lights switch on.

“That’s more like it - _thank_ you Jack!” Carefully he aimed the nozzle at the Glattian and fired, and the alien sank down against the wall in a crumpled heap.

“Did... did you just kill it?” Josh asked, eyes wide, and Alex shook his head vehemently. “Just zonked him for half an hour or so. He’ll be fine.”

He flicked a switch and then tossed the gun at Matt, who clumsily caught it. “Hold that a minute, will you? I think I saw-”

“How did you know how to use that? Something... about Jack?” Matt asked, as he stared at the alien gun in his hands. He was holding an actual alien gun... his head began spinning, and he almost didn’t hear Alex’s reply.

“Jack lets me mess around with his weapons collection sometimes, and has given me some basic training - figured it might come in handy and he was right!” Then suddenly his eyes grew, and he looked at both of them.

“Oh - and don’t tell my Uncle, OK? He’d seriously freak and Jack and I would be in _so_ much trouble! You have... _no_ idea, trust me!”

“Um... OK,” Matthew answered. He was a bit freaked out by this latest revelation, but somehow he didn't find it hard to believe that Jack had lots of alien weapons... They'd wondered for a long time what exactly Torchwood did.

“So your uncle is like a pacifist?” Josh asked, and Alex looked up from the alien’s side, slowly shaking his head. “No... Well yes. He’s...”

He lowered his eyes and was silent for a long moment.

“He fought in the greatest war ever, and doesn’t want me involved in anything violent at all. Probably wouldn’t let me near a gun before I was five hundred, if it was up to him. I get _why_ \- I really do, especially what with my dad and all - but it’s not very practical.”

Matt wondered if that 500 was literal, but was then distracted by Alex’s mention of his father. He remembered that back when they were younger Alex had often talked about him, but at some point - when they’d been around 8 or 9 - Alex had suddenly stopped mentioning him at all. Matt didn’t really know how to broach the subject however, and just then Alex finished looking the alien over, pulling off a cylindrical device strapped to its arm.

“Better take this... If I can just fix it a little...”

A moment later he had done something or other, and handed the thing to Josh. “Just hold it near to your mouth whenever you speak and it’ll pick up English.”

Then he grinned widely and took the gun out of Matt’s hands.

“So? Wanna go explore this boat and find out how to get home?”

Silently they nodded, and Matt could feel his heart beating excitedly as they followed Alex out the door and down the corridor. Apart from being scared shitless and feeling generally unsettled, this could turn out to be the best holiday ever... Although Alex seemed to pick up on something or other that the other two couldn’t as they walked past the different doors.

“Alex... what is it?” Matt asked, voice barely above a whisper, their bare feet making no sound against the cool floor.

Alien floor. He was walking on the floor of an alien spaceship...

“Well, what do you think is behind all the other doors?” Alex said, and Josh and Matt looked at each other.

“You mean they abducted more people?” Josh asked, and Alex nodded.

“And they’re all as scared as you...”

“But...” Matt put a hand on Alex’s arm. “Shouldn’t we... let them out?”

Alex stopped, slowly shaking his head.

“It’ll be hard enough just for the three of us. The more we are, the more likely we are to get caught. And some of them are angry and they'd want to fight... Some of these species are very aggressive.”

With that he turned and kept walking, and Josh shrugged and followed. Matt still felt that he was right, but there was nothing he could do.

When they got to the end of the corridor, Alex swiftly tapped a code into the panel beside the large doors, and they found themselves in another corridor, identical to the one they'd just left.

This went on for quite a while, and the thrill of being in an alien spaceship was beginning to be overtaken by the realisation that even aliens could have very boring interior design. Now and again they had to hide when Alex sensed Glattians nearby - and Matt began to wonder if maybe he was dreaming the whole thing.

“Do you have any idea where we’re going?” Josh asked at one point, and Alex rolled his eyes impatiently.

“Why do you think I bothered to look through that guy’s brain? Of course I know! But it’s a big ship, and I’d really like to find a communication point so I can send a message to my Uncle.”

He tapped in another code, but this time when the door opened they were standing at the entrance to a huge room, full of glass cases - every case housing a different alien.

“This is the centre,” Alex said, looking around. “Which is where they keep their museum - in here is a perfectly preserved specimen of every creature they’ve found since they set off. We need... We need to get to those doors over there...”

Following their guide, as he weaved in and out of the cases, Matt and Josh found it hard not to linger between all the fantastical displays - having never seen a real alien before, they were now treated to the sight of hundreds...

Then Josh stopped in front of a case holding an ethereally beautiful elfin creature, its skin a delicate pale purple, and its eyes oddly compelling - as bewitching as a mermaid and twice as alluring.

“Alex,” Josh asked, “What’s this one?”

Alex turned and sighed.

“Of all the times for you to start channelling Jack...”

He ran a hand through is hair. “Um... It’s a Star Poet, from Arcateen V, and I’m sure Jack can introduce you to one that’s actually alive.”

“Introduce me...” Josh said blankly, as Alex grabbed hold of him and pulled him along.

“Yes, introduce you. He’s a fifty-first century kind a guy, our Jack, and he can even tell you the best ways of chatting up a Malmooth. And will you _hurry up_!”

They’d barely set off again when Alex suddenly froze on the spot at the sight of the glass case in front of them. Inside it was what looked like a red human-spider hybrid, about the size of a hand.

“This- this shouldn’t be here!” he said, not taking his eyes off the creature.

“Why? What is it?” Josh replied, wrinkling his nose.

“It’s a Racnoss - and it’s supposed to be extinct!” He looked more serious than Matt had ever seen.

“Like a dinosaur?” Josh asked, getting interested. “That’s cool!”

Alex shot him an irritated look. “No, not like a dinosaur. Dinosaurs are only extinct _now_ , but from a non-linear, objective point of view they’re alive and kicking. It’s perfectly possible to nip back in time and catch a pet pterodactyl, for example. No really, I’ve done that. This however, should not exist! It’s dangerous...”

He walked right up to the case staring at the Racnoss and reaching out a tentative hand, stopping short by a few centimeters. “It’s alarmed. I can’t...”

“Um... aren’t we supposed to be hurrying?” Matt asked, and Alex turned, looking from them and back to the case.

“Yes...” He appeared to struggle with himself, biting his lip. “I don’t know what to do!”

This was a ridiculous statement, Matt realised, as he and Josh just stared at their friend. Alex _always_ knew what to do - always. It was infuriating at times, but right now this sudden hesitation was a double shock.

“How can you _not know_? What is there to decide?” Josh asked, exasperated, and Alex just looked at him silently for a endless moment, before snapping out of it.

“Of course - we have to go. Come on.”

Matt and Josh looked at each other and shook their heads. Apparently Alex was even weirder than they had previously thought. And they noticed that he kept turning his head and looking behind them. Why had a tiny spider alien shaken him so badly?

As the doors closed behind them however, Alex caught sight of a console on the wall and almost bounced.

“Yes!”

Although after a moment a deep furrow appeared in his forehead.

“This is problematic. They’ve got a perception filter around the whole ship... Very clever of them, but it means that they’re almost impossible to find. Hmmm.”

Matt and Josh didn’t know what to say, but Alex didn’t seem to need their input anyway.

“OK, look at this.”

Pointing to the screen, they saw a model of the space craft.

“See? We are here, and there are escape pods here...”

He tapped a few more keys and smiled triumphantly as a 3-D image of the pods came up on the screen. “Aren’t they brilliant? Very Invader Zim actually. Now I’ll send my Uncle a message, explaining where we are and so on, but to be honest I don’t think we need him - we can perfectly easily make our own way back if we’re lucky... ”

He started typing again, and Josh blinked.

“You mean - you can fly one of those?”

“Oh yeah,” Alex replied, hands never stopping as they flew over the keys, “I can fly like... _anything_. But will they let me have a space ship? Oooh no! It’s ‘too dangerous’, apparently. Just because I almost crashed the TARDIS that one time when I was twelve, but even Uncle does that on a regular basis... well he ends up in the wrong place half the time at least. And it’s not like I’d have to have a Millennium Falcon or anything, just a simple, little ship would do. Hey - maybe they’d let me keep the escape pod?”

Matt listened silently. Part of him was still somewhat blown away by the whole alien thing, but as Alex chattered on Matt began to realise that on some level at least Alex was definitely the same boy he’d known for all these years - the slightly peevish tone seeping into his complaint was very familiar indeed, even if the things he spoke about were fantastical.

“All done!” Alex smiled, pressing a final key. “Let’s go home!”

Having an actual plan made thing easier, even though Matt began to feel uncomfortably claustrophobic as they got into a lift taking them to the right deck.

But nothing could have prepared him for the sight that greeted him as the doors opened. His entire field of vision was filled with a giant window, the whole of the Milky Way apparently on the other side of the glass.

Wordlessly they all three walked over to the window. Matt turned to ask Alex to tell him where they were, but stopped at the faraway look on his friend’s face. Seeing the stars reflected in the other’s eyes somehow brought home on a whole other level that Alex really wasn’t human. And the look on his face wasn’t the same awe and astonishment that Matt felt. It was... something slightly different, something he couldn’t work out.

Instead Matt turned to Josh, and together they started attempting to place the different stars. They had always been very keen on astronomy, and trying to make this view fit into the star maps they used at school somehow helped them deal with the unreality of the situation.

Then Matt turned to ask Alex if they hadn’t better be leaving, and froze.

Down the corridor he saw 20 Glattians, fully armed, walking towards them.


	3. Interlude

_The starscape spread out before them, the Seeker was as usual reduced to silent awe. He knew they ought to get out of there, but he felt that he couldn’t deny his friends their first proper look at the universe._

_And as he stood there, observing his friends’ wonder, he suddenly understood why the Doctor always found himself new companions, never mind the pain. It meant seeing the world anew through their eyes, over and over and over again. He heard them beginning to talk - arranging the stars into their world, trying to make the endlessness fit into maps and diagrams, because they could only ever grasp it in bits._

_Of course they only saw the **history** of the universe, the light as it had been millions of years ago when it had first left the stars. Their ‘now’. He wished that they could see it the way he did - how the stars danced through time; growing, blossoming, and collapsing... Falling through time and space in intricate patterns and untold beauty. Worlds upon worlds upon worlds..._

_Unlike his father he didn’t need to posses the universe it to own it - but he still wanted it **all**._

_(Seek and ye shall find.)_

_Except without all this drama. The Doctor would have been in his element, he knew, but the Seeker just felt helpless... No, that wasn’t it. If his friends hadn’t been there he’d have been fine. But being responsible for them made everything infinitely complicated, because he knew that above all he needed to keep them **safe**._

_Which was something completely at odds with going back to the baby Rachnoss, which he had to forcibly stop himself from doing._

_The problem **there** of course being that he knew that he ought to destroy it (keeping the universe safe from such threats was his duty as a Timelord), and yet he wanted nothing more than to take it home and study it. And he couldn’t do either because it’d be insanely dangerous for his friends._

_Glancing at them he could feel them slipping out of his grasp, even though they were by his side. He could tell them the name of every star, as they had surely guessed by now - and yet they were talking to each other, and not to him... And he knew that the truth was that with every revelation about himself he’d move further away from them. He should probably have told them the truth years ago, but he’d wanted to be ‘just Alex’ for as long as possible..._

_Speaking freely was of course an immense relief - but the price was heavy. Hopefully the gap between them would not be unbridgeable though - after all they **had** known him since they were all just 4. Looking out at the galaxies, part of him wanted nothing more than to leave - to go out there where he belonged - but at the same time he knew that these boys were his only chance of true friendship with humans - their life span his main link to human life. Earth was **home**... and yet every beat of his hearts helped underline how he would always stand apart._

_Main problem at the moment being that now he also had a terrible urge to show off - to demonstrate all the things he could do. How many times had they watched the original Star Wars trilogy while he’d kept silent about how he too could blur people’s minds_ (“These are not the droids you are looking for...”) _\- he couldn’t remember a time when he hadn’t been doing that, actually. But it was such a simple thing - like distracting someone by pointing to something over their shoulder._

_Of course today he’d done far more than that - had actively forced his will on another creature and probed its mind. Actions the Doctor had warned him against so sternly that he knew he’d get a serious - and welldeserved - telling off sooner or later. And he understood why now... the untold reason the Doctor had never shared: It was easy. Terrifyingly so._

_Slowly he tore himself out of his musings. He needed to get his friends home - they were his responsibility, especially since they had no knowledge of how to deal with a situation like this. If he’d told them earlier, by now they would have had a clue and might even have helped out, being bright and all... and that lack of preparation was his fault._

_Then Matt silently touched his arm. Seeing the look on his friend’s face the Seeker turned his head._

_And saw the guards advancing towards them._

_He knew he shouldn’t swear. He knew that the Doctor could cope with any number of set-backs and problems without doing so. But there were times when he was very much his father’s son - and liked it._

_“Oh **fuck**!”_


	4. Chapter 2

Josh suddenly felt like he couldn’t breathe. It seemed that there wasn’t actually room for anything in his head except the numerous alien weapons aimed squarely at him. As through a daze he heard Alex swear, and then saw him slowly throw down the gun, which ruled out any possibility of his best friend (who-had-suddenly-turned-out-to-be-an-alien) also being some kind of superhero who could mow down any attackers in his way...

He was shaken out of his frozen state when Alex very slowly moved himself to act as some sort of human - or alien, rather - shield, before starting to speak what had to be Glattian, and the little cylinder thing in Josh’s hand began to spew out a translation...

“Um... Please don’t shoot.”

Alex’s face looked almost as tense as Josh felt. “Sorry about the awkwardness of this... I - I seek audience with your leader under peaceful contract, according to convention 15 of the Shadow Proclamation. OK?”

The aliens started muttering amongst themselves, and then one of them, the only one dressed in green, spoke into some sort of communication thing on its wrist.

“What was that?” Matt whispered to Alex, leaning forward, and Alex suddenly smiled.

“Baloo taught me the Jungle Law and all its Masterwords when I was only a cub. Comes in handy.”

Matt shook his head, and Josh shot him an understanding look. Apparently nothing - not even life-or-death situations - stopped Alex from quoting his favourite books.

After a short moment, however, the aliens finished their conference, and the green clad one, who appeared to be the leader, addressed Alex.

“Come along children. The Captain wishes to see you.”

“Excellent,” Alex beamed, and - snatching the translator from Josh’s hand - stepped forward happily.

“By the way, could you furnish my friends with better translators? This one’s a bit... basic. And, if I may ask, what is a surgeon doing commanding troops?”

The alien let two of its eyes fasten on Alex with a look that could only be surprise.

“And who are you to asks such questions?”

Alex just smiled, utterly unconcerned.

“Just curious. Or are you a military doctor of some kind? I’m afraid I wasn’t as attentive as I should have been during my lessons.”

The alien didn’t answer, instead ordering one of the guards to ‘sort out the human children’, and Josh tried to not show too much worry as a tall blue bulk approached and attached a small starshaped object to his ear.

But the next time one of the aliens spoke it sounded as if it was speaking English, and Alex winked at them, before being distracted by the surgeon, who was now guiding them towards another lift.

Josh told himself that if Alex was calm enough to make small talk with their alien captors, then things were probably OK, although it was possible that he was just lying...

Again.

Because clearly Alex was even better at lying than they had previously suspected, Josh thought with a fair amount of bitterness. And it didn’t help that Alex was now chatting with the surgeon with perfect ease. It turned out that he - the surgeon - had been in the middle of dissecting an ‘Arkan’ when called away, and Alex was excitedly asking questions. (An Arkan being a creature which - bizarrely - was apparently made up mostly of water, from what Josh could gather from the conversation, and thus somewhat problematic from a surgical point of view.)

Matt was looking as uneasy as Josh felt - probably worrying about the poor alien that was being cut up, something Alex (ever the scientist) was blithely ignoring. Josh, however, was feeling rather jealous. He was good with people, but aliens were something else... He’d have given his right arm for Alex’s easy banter.

Then the doors whooshed open, and Josh forgot everything he’d been thinking. In front of them was the ship’s bridge, and it was everything he could ever have dreamt. A giant curved window took up about a quarter of the walls, and in front of it were rows upon rows upon rows of control panels, full of blinking lights and a myriad of buttons. There were more Glattians, all in bright blue uniforms - in a shade which clashed terribly with their skin tone, Josh noted disapprovingly - and odd purple balls which hung almost motionless in the air.

Matt asked in a whisper what they were, and Alex explained that they were living, sentient cameras - lab created cyborgs and rather popular thanks to their efficiency. He started saying something about unions, but then they were summoned by the Captain, and Alex stepped forwards, as diplomatic a look on his face as Josh had ever seen.

“So, these are the human children who escaped? Speak child.”

Josh held his breath as his friend started talking - this was quite literally life or death, and he silently prayed that Alex’s gift of the gab would prove useful once more.

“Greetings Captain. Many apologies for any upset we might have caused, we were merely trying to get home after you abducted us - in clear violation of the laws of the Shadow Proclamation, I might add. However, I hope we can sort this out amicably. You see, a little while ago I sent a message to my family, and they should arrive shortly to rescue me and my friends. Either let us go - which would be the most preferable option by far - or, when my family arrives, be exceedingly polite, since they will be... very upset that I was stolen. Do we understand each other?”

Then he frowned, eyes caught by the controls.

“Oh and if you like, I can tell you how to boost the efficiency of your engines by 37.4% - it’s quite simple...”

The Captain blinked thrice, and frowned. Josh hoped that frowning was a good thing for Glattians.

“What is this nonsense?” he asked. “We do no reward insolence, child.”

Alex was finally beginning to show some of the worry that Josh had felt the whole time.

“I’m not being insolent. Please believe me - my family is coming and they will _kill_ you, unless-”

All three of the Captain’s eyes began to look very angry, and Josh pulled at Alex’s sleeve.

“Alex! Have you gone _insane_? What the hell are you doing _threatening_ them?”

His friend turned, pale and serious.

“You don’t understand. These guys _stole_ me and my dad... God, you have _no idea_. He’s going to _slaughter_ them, and my uncle is going to let him...”

He was interrupted by the Captain, whose attention was now on the guards stationed behind them.

“Enough. The human children are wasting our time. Take them away and find out how they escaped. Make sure their feat cannot be replicated, then ready them for studying.”

Alex sighed deeply and very nearly rolled his eyes.

“Oh come _on_ , it should be _obvious_ that I’m not human.”

The Captain let one dismissive eye turn towards him, and what probably passed for a Glattian sneer crossed his face as he looked at Alex.

“I’m sure we’ll work out what sort of mongrel you are soon enough.”

The soldiers stepped forwards, laying heavy, blue hands on them, and Josh felt that terrible fear he’d first encountered in the holding cell come back with a vengeance. This was it. They were all going to die, just like that. He felt like he was going to be sick.

Even Alex looked like he was frozen with shock, and for a moment Josh thought that the situation had finally hit him. But then...

“How _dare_ you?” Alex exploded, wrenching himself out of the guards grasp and staring at the Captain as if he could kill him with just a look.

“I was born to _rule the universe_ you worthless troglodyte with the brain of an adipose and the integrity of a Slitheen. If I had an army still, you wouldn’t live long enough to even _think_ of begging for mercy.”

The silence that followed Alex’s outburst was so complete that Josh didn’t dare breathe. All he could think was ‘Oh G-d, he’s finally snapped, just like his dad... We are _so_ dead!’

Then the Captain leaned forwards, eyes fixed on Alex with unnerving intensity.

“Who are you?”

A cold, haughty smile on his face Alex let his eyes take in the whole bridge, as he slowly folded his arms, head held high - all of a sudden reminding Josh of the footage of Harold Saxon when he’d faced off against President Winters.

“I am the Seeker, only son of the Master; and _I_ -” he paused for effect, “-am the last child of Gallifrey.”

There was another silence, but this time it was swiftly broken by whispering amongst all the Glattians.

‘Timelord...’ ‘It can’t be...’ ‘the legends say...’

Then the Captain spoke, disbelief and uncertainty clear as day on his face.

“Impossible.”

Josh didn’t have a clue what Alex was doing, but whatever it was he could almost _feel_ the shift of power in the room.

“Count the hearts, Glattian.”

Josh and Matt stepped back as a guard came forwards with some kind of scanner, and Alex pocketed his bracelet, silently waiting for a verdict. For a moment Josh looked at the spectacle as from the outside, viewing it as if he were watching a movie - and the image was utterly incongruous. Alex, slender, pyjama-clad and tousle-haired, with perfect disdain and grace allowing the far stronger, taller and seemingly more powerful Glattians the honour of ascertaining his credentials. Trying to take on board the implications, he wondered... what exactly _was_ a ‘Timelord’?

Alex had, on account of his father, always been somewhat notorious when they went out together, but he had always brushed it aside, unconcerned with ‘reflected notoriety’. Yet now he seemed to grasp a different inheritance - and was _using_ it.

Plus, and Josh’s eyes narrowed, he had called himself ‘the Seeker’ and not ‘Alex’. A different name after all, just as he’d expected...

Then the gizmos apparently proved Alex right, and the Captain was now watching him with undisclosed... something or other Josh couldn’t quite determine. Something unpleasant in any case. Something that looked like desire, or greed, or hunger...

“Tell me young Seeker, is it true was said of the Timelords? That they had the power of gods? That they knew all the secrets of the universe and could tell the future?”

Alex appeared to mull this over.

“Don’t know about the power of _gods_... Although from _your_ point of view I suppose that’s not entirely inaccurate. Time and space bends to our desires, and the past and the future are ours to command if we so wish it.”

“But you are only a child,” the Captain said slowly, and Alex - through nothing more than a raised eyebrow - somehow managed to communicate utter contempt and superiority.

“And yet I have seen eternity. I know the story of Glattis from first to last, its fate a mere drop in the cosmos. A million worlds such as yours were destroyed in the Time War... And mark my words, my uncle was the man who ended that war.”

There was a pause, as the Captain studied Alex, all three eyes fixed on him with a look that was exceedingly unnerving. Alex, however, didn’t so much as blink.

“Does your uncle have a name?” the Captain finally asked, and Josh could have sworn that Alex shook his head just the tiniest fraction. But he answered readily enough... by not answering.

“The Daleks called him The Oncoming Storm. He _might_ show you mercy, if you make sure to explain very carefully that this is all a misunderstanding.”

The Captain sat very still, but then a determined look entered all three eyes and he began issuing orders left and right.

“Guards - escort the Timelord and his human pets to the most secure holding cell on the ship, and guard him with your lives. Pilot - fire up all the engines and set a course straight to Glattis. Crew - get us ready for an interstellar space jump. And keep a lookout for any craft following us and fire on them pre-emptively.”

Guards once more closed in on them and Josh sought out Matt’s eyes. What now?

And then Alex - their always calm, reliable and self-possessed friend - collapsed into hysterical giggles.


	5. Chapter 3

Holding up a hand, Alex slowly caught his breath as his giggling subsided, and then - seeing that they were rather in the middle of everything - moved towards one of the corners, telling the guards to wait a minute, which they agreed to, after a confirming nod from the Captain.

“You OK?” Matt asked carefully, wondering if there was a polite way of asking _‘Did you go completely do-dally like your Dad?’_

Alex chuckled a little more, then shook his head.

“I’m fine. Honestly. It’s just... OK, there is this joke-” he shot the guards an apologetic look, “-about Glattians. Um, imagine that there are only 5 Glattians left, four males, one from every House...”

He frowned, then waved a hand. “Oh screw that, it’s all very complicated, but basically they’re all rivals. Just say four males and the last one is a female - who only has one reproductive cycle left. What do they do?"

Matt, bewildered, stared at him mutely, and Josh was clearly as lost. Alex smiled triumphantly.

"They put her in a museum because she's the last of her kind!"

"And that's... funny?"

Alex had always had a rather sideways kind of humour, but this was just bizarre.

"It's funny because it's _true_ , don't you see? They've just done exactly the same thing - put something impossibly rare above survival."

Josh frowned. "But... they're taking us back to their planet... they said that they'd fire at anyone..."

The smile faded from Alex’s face, and he cast a rueful glance around the busy bridge, and when he spoke it seemed that he was mostly talking to himself.

"I'll need to talk to the Doctor when they arrive, if I can just _explain_..."

One of the guards inclined his head.

“Timelord? If you have recovered from your strange fit, we need to-”

He stopped as there was a strange cranking sound combined with a wild gust of wind, and Alex’s head snapped up.

And then - in front of Matt’s disbelieving eyes - a blue box materialised in the middle of the floor. A tall, blue police box, like the one that was now a coffee shop, next to the beach where his family had gone on holiday one year...

A second later one of the doors burst open and Harold Saxon - the actual, real, Harold Saxon - stepped out, the biggest and scariest gun Matt had ever seen in his hands.

Alex cried out "Dad!" and Saxon's face changed completely, as Alex ran across the bridge and flung himself into his father’s arms.

Of all the things that had happened that night, this was somehow the strangest. What was Harold Saxon doing _here_? Everyone knew he was in prison...

Slowly taking his eyes off Alex and his dad, he noticed that Alex’s uncle and Jack had also appeared - Jack with a similarly huge and intimidating gun, which he was using to hold up the whole crew as if he’d never done anything else.

As soon as Saxon let go of Alex his uncle came forward for a hug of his own, and Saxon, a grim smile on his face and eyes dancing maliciously, raised his gun again and nodded to Jack.

Then, finally, someone seemed to realise that Matt and Josh were there too, as Jack walked over to them. Could it really have been just a few hours since he’d dropped them off in a little Welsh valley, warning them against the sheep?

“Hello again,” he said, grin as wide and unconcerned as ever. “You OK?”

Matt did his best to nod, and then noticed that Alex was now talking to his uncle at breakneck speed.

“...so you see it was all a misunderstanding. But! They have a Rachnoss. It's just a dead baby, but it looks like it's perfectly sound. And they have tons of creatures locked up - like hundreds - but-"

He was cut off by Jack poking him.

"Alex? Could I just have your hand?"

"Um... what?"

Taking Alex’s hand he placed it on his odd wrist-strap thing, motioned Matt and Josh to do the same, and the next second there was a bright, disorienting flash and then the four of them - Jack, Alex, Matt and Josh - found themselves in some kind of high tech cavernous place.

Matt looked around, rather stunned and a little dizzy after his second ever teleporting, and unable to work out where on earth they could be. Then he caught sight of a wall with ‘Torchwood’ painted on the bricks, and breathed a sigh of relief. At least they were back on Earth...

Alex, however, was clearly not sharing his feelings as he jumped at Jack, reaching for his wrist.

"Take me _back!_ Jack - take me back _now!"_

But Jack held his teleporting thing out of reach, incredulous.

_"What?"_

_"Jack!_ That thing wouldn't even _work_ if it wasn't for me! Take me _back!"_

Jack looked more pissed off than Matt and Josh had ever seen, and they both instinctively retreated backwards, not wanting to get caught up in the argument.

Why on Earth did Alex want to go back? Jack clearly had the same problem, as he started speaking, voice tight with anger.

"You listen to me Seeker! _First_ of all, the main thing was to get you back safely and keep you safe. _Second_..."

For a moment his hand clenched, and it looked as if he was seriously considering punching Alex. Instead he kept talking, but his voice was so full of fury that it almost felt like a slap.

"You put a delay on your message! Fifteen minutes. _Fifteen minutes!_ Do you have any - _any_ \- idea how absolutely terrified we've been? How _fucking long_ fifteen minutes is? After-" he stopped abruptly, swallowing against emotions almost too strong to contain.

Alex opened his mouth and Jack held up a hand, and when he spoke again his voice once more under control, cold and biting.

"Keep your explanations for the Doctor, I don’t want to hear them. Right now you can just go sit down and think about the choice you made."

Radiating seething rebellion Alex walked over to a sofa and threw himself down on it, arms crossed and entire body sulking.

Jack turned to the other two, taking a deep breath and aiming for a smile.

"Welcome to Torchwood... Sorry about that. You _sure_ you’re OK?”

“I... I think so,” Matt replied, and Josh nodded.

“Just a bit... I mean we just found out that Alex...”

He shot their sullen friend a look, and Jack’s eyes narrowed.

“Ah. Well we figured it’d come out sooner or later. Now, why don’t you sit down and I'll make you some tea and see if I can discover where Ianto hides the good biscuits. Then we can have a little chat and I can answer any questions you might have. That sound OK?"

They both nodded gratefully and sat themselves down on the sofa next to Alex, but as Jack turned to go, Alex fidgeted.

“Why aren’t they back yet?”

Jack stopped, shooting Alex a rather cold look over his shoulder.

"Hasn't even been 15 minutes yet..."

Alex glowered back at him. "Sod off Jack."

"Well _excuse_ me young master-"

At his words Alex visibly flinched, for the first time showing hurt rather than anger.

“Don’t call me that!” he said, with such vehemence that Jack’s eyes narrowed and he obviously decided to forget about the tea for the time being as he took a step closer to the sofa, watching Alex carefully.

“What happened?”

Alex held Jack’s eyes for a moment, then he looked down, nervously playing with his bracelet.

"I... lost my temper. Apparently...”

A swift flicker of his eyes to Jack’s face then he lowered them again.

“...apparently I turn into dad when I get really angry."

If Matt hadn’t been watching Jack’s face he’d have missed it, but as it was, he saw Jack freeze - only for a second, but for that second a look of something undefinable shone out of Jack’s eyes... Fear, apprehension, worry? Matt couldn’t quite work it out, but it was extremely unsettling.

“What did you do?” Jack then slowly asked, voice so careful that Matt marvelled.

Alex shrugged.

"Oh I didn't _do_ anything, except tell the Glattians that they weren’t fit to lick my shoes... You know the stuff. Thank goodness the Doctor will never-"

He stopped abruptly, hands covering his mouth in horror.

"Oh god! The cameras! What if they're watching... I'm so screwed. I'll be grounded until I'm 500..."

For a moment he sat perfectly still, staring into the distance, then lowered his hands, and his voice turned oddly helpless.

"The Doctor will think I never heard a single thing he taught me!"

Seeing that Matt and Josh were by now not following at all, he elaborated.

"The first - the most important thing I ever leaned - is that just because I'm better than everyone else doesn't mean that I'm better than everyone else. Fucked _that_ up totally."

Matt slowly shook his head, not ready to let this pass.

"You're _better_ than everyone else?"

"Well he's certainly better at feeling sorry for himself!" Jack noted drolly. Matt and Josh chuckled, and Alex shot them a dirty look, before getting defensive.

"But I _am_ better! It’s not like I can help being what I am. Every word I told the Glattians was the truth!"

Josh raised an eyebrow, unimpressed, and his tone was deeply mocking when he spoke:

"You were 'born to rule the universe'? You seriously expect us to believe that?"

"But I _was_.” The angry pride was back with a vengeance now.

“When I was born my father ruled the world and was just about to unleash war on the whole universe. Think Star Wars. I swear, we could have ruled until the end of time...” His eyes unfocussed, as he slowly continued.

“100,000 warships. 6 billion Toclafane - ready to fly and blaze and slice. I look down that path and...”

He stopped and buried his head in his hands, just as Matt was beginning to get seriously freaked out.

“Look I’ll explain later OK? It’s... complicated,” Alex mumbled between his fingers, and Matt nodded cautiously. If he was honest with himself, he wasn’t sure he _wanted_ an explanation.

Jack, who had been almost immobile throughout, now stepped forward and layed a hand on Alex’s shoulder.

“Listen, Seeker - why don’t you come with me and help make some tea? Maybe you can even persuade the coffee maker to work...”

Alex looked up and nodded, before slowly getting up, and Matt wondered if he’d ever again come close to understanding his friend. At least he and Josh still had each other...

“Jack!” Josh called out, and Jack stopped, half-turning.

“Yes?”

”Are you... are you an alien too?”

This hadn’t occurred to Matt at all, but he now watched Jack with some of the same unease Josh was displaying.

“No Josh, I’m not an alien. Although I _am_ from the future - the 51st Century to be exact - if you were wondering about...”

He made a flourish with his hand, and Josh nodded, looking very thoughtful, as Jack sent him a small, rather private smile, before following Alex towards the kitchen, wherever that might be. And yet again Matt decided to never ask them exactly what was going on there.

Really, Alex-being-an-alien would slot in quite neatly alongside his decision to never inquire into Josh’s love life. Sometimes Matt seriously wondered how someone as normal as him had ever made such unusual friends.

***

  


In the kitchen Jack found the Seeker studying the coffee maker with great concentration.

“I don’t know what happened to it, but it absorbed some kind of artificial intelligence at some point. Not a lot, but enough so that it’s established a psychic bond with Ianto... Don’t think it’s wise to try to mess with that.”

Watching him Jack’s throat all of a sudden felt much too tight. His little brother-by-proxy... concerned about interfering with a coffee maker. In a flash the night’s antics was thrown into sharp relief, and in a single swift move he stepped up to the Seeker and swept him up into a big hug.

“I thought I’d lost you,” he whispered ( _’Like I lost Gray’_ ), and he could feel the Seeker smile against his shirt.

“Can’t get rid of me that easily.”

“Shut up.”

Two hearts beating against his chest - his very own clever Seeker. (Not Alex. No, not Alex. Certainly not tonight. He’d never realised it before, but he suddenly understood that one reason the Seeker insisted on those in the know using his ‘real’, self-chosen, name, was because it had nothing to do with his father... Alexander the Great was the Master’s projection, the heir-apparent to a could-have-been empire, built on humanity's pain...)

“Wish you’d been there with us,” the Seeker finally mumbled into Jack’s coat, and he could feel the mountain of guilt that he’d tried to hold at bay threatening to tumble down and bury him. _He_ had been the one to suggest the camping holiday, _he_ had chosen the camp site...

Noting his silence, the Seeker pulled away, studying him.

“It wasn’t your fault,” he said bluntly, then turned around and started filling the kettle.

“Seeker-” Jack said, and the boy slowly turned around, reaching out for the tea pot on the work top behind Jack.

“Look, the guilt is pretty much _dripping_ off you. Stop it. _I_ was never in any danger. The only ones at risk were my friends, so if you want to beg forgiveness off anyone, go back to them. Josh, certainly, wouldn’t mind letting you cry on his shoulder...”

The minutely raised eyebrow spoke volumes, and Jack’s eyes hardened.

“Listen, I’ve had enough of all these insinuations. Yes I’ve taken him under my wing, but dammit, he’s a _child!_ I would _never_ -”

He stopped abruptly at the triumphant gleam in the Seeker’s eyes, and took a calming breath. _Damn_ the boy, always ten steps ahead, and far, _far_ too good at playing people...

“And... don’t change the subject,” he added, trying to find four clean mugs and a tray to put them on.

“Actually I think I have to,” the Seeker said, as he spooned tea leaves into the pot, before shooting Jack a wary look.

“Did they ask about the wrist strap?”

For a second Jack’s thoughts jumped to the Master’s laser screwdriver, still tucked away safely, and secretly, in the Torchwood safe, and sighed.

“No they didn’t ask. _Yet_... What’s the cover story again? Three years ago?”

The Seeker nodded as he poured the now boiling water into the pot.

“Yup. I was studying teleportation then - the Doctor specifically told me not to mess with your vortex manipulator.”

“I... see”, Jack said cautiously. “Are you sure this _particular_ cover story is a good idea?”

The Seeker waved a dismissive hand.

“Compared to the mess I’m in right now, it’ll hardly register. Plus your wrist strap works perfectly, right? Which will help when it comes to-”

He cut off, one of those secretive smiles on his face that Jack knew he’d not be able to penetrate, and put the tea pot and a strainer on the tray, along with the bottle of milk he'd fished out of the fridge.

“Biscuits?”

Jack reached behind him and grabbed the biscuit tin (trying to find Ianto’s secret stash was a task for another time), and then followed the Seeker back to where Matt and Josh were waiting. Surprisingly they hadn’t fallen asleep, but then he noticed the slightly guilty looks in their eyes and the furtive glances, and realised that they’d obviously done some exploring of the mysterious Torchwood... Trying to suppress a smile he dumped the tin on the table and Matt cleared his throat.

“Um, Alex- you know how you used to say that your uncle made it snow at Christmas?”

The Seeker looked up from distributing mugs and smiled, a hint of tension draining away.

“Oh he does! Really it’s very simple - just basic atmospheric excitation. Here, let me show you!”

He grabbed a pen and paper from a nearby desk, and started writing as Jack poured the tea, and for a few minutes the three young friends were clearly back to normal, as Matt and Josh made space in the middle of the sofa and the Seeker happily explained the more complex aspects of weather manipulation. Just three pyjama-clad boys, not worrying about the past or the future or what species they were...

The grind of the TARDIS engines cut through the scene as the sudden wind blew the papers away, effectively ending the mini-lecture and breaking the mood.

Jack saw the Seeker look up, considerably paler than before, but clearly ready to face whatever was coming, never mind the consequences.


	6. Chapter 4

Where did the wind come from, Josh wondered. Was it just displaced air? The box was quite substantial after all... And what exactly _was_ that box? Some kind of teleport booth? Made with alien technology, but painted like a police box - weird.

His thoughts were cut off by the door opening, and once more it was Harold Saxon who stepped out first - although the difference was startling. Previously he had been armed, wrathful, coiled as a spring; this time he walked out with his arms outstretched, and a grin so wide it looked like his face might split. (Josh recognised it from old footage he’d seen. It had always given him the creeps.)

“Where is that son of mine?” Saxon asked and Alex stepped forward, looking as if he was going to his own execution.

“Come here, my Great One - my prince, born to rule the universe!”

Alex tried to hide his wincing, but didn’t quite succeed, and Josh for the first time truly understood how having no father at all could be a bonus.

He noticed that Alex’s uncle also exited the box, but he didn’t do anything except quietly close the door before leaning against it, face inscrutable as Harold Saxon closed the gap between himself and his reluctant son, sweeping him up in an exaggerated hug.

After a long moment Saxon slowly pulled away, his hands gripping Alex’s arms affectionately.

"Lord Seeker, it is a _risk_ having children, you know. There's no telling how they'll turn out. You watch and you worry and you hope and then - _suddenly_ \- one day, all your dearest wished and dreams come true: the child has become everything you ever dreamed of!”

He stopped, trying to compose himself as his emotions were almost getting the better of him.

“Oh my son, not Rassilon himself could have done better. Whenever you want to start ruling the universe, just say the word, I'll be there."

Alex shifted as much as he could, clearly deeply uncomfortable, and yet obviously affected by his father’s praise.

"I don't _want_ to rule the universe, you _know_ that Dad."

Saxon shot the Doctor a swift glance over his shoulder, then winked at Alex.

"Oh of _course_ not. But...”

The gleeful pride became overlaid with something darker and more disturbing as he studied Alex, eyes dark and full of shadows that made Josh shiver involuntarily.

“...tell me one thing. And be honest."

Leaning forward he whispered into Alex’s ear. Alex went completely still, and his father took a step back, studying him silently, until Alex finally nodded - a small, reluctant nod, but a definite yes.

Saxon’s face lit up once more, and the untamed joyful malice that shone out of his eyes suddenly made the ordeal on the spaceship somehow fade in significance.

“Knew it! Oh, I'm getting you something special, boy. Something magnificent! Something... _spectacular_. Just wait!"

Glancing at the Doctor again, he rolled his eyes dramatically.

"Although it looks like grumpy-pant there wants a word. Remember - you earned every gold star in _my_ book."

Grinning widely he sauntered off, leaving Alex to face the man who was clearly much more like a normal parent... Studying him, Josh had a sudden, and very unwelcome, sense of deja vu - the look in the Doctor’s eyes had that exact same look of _‘You are just like your father after all - words cannot describe how disappointed I am in you’_ that had been on Josh’s mother’s face when she’d last year discovered that he’d been sleeping around...

"Well you've certainly made your father very happy," the Doctor said lightly, hands in his pockets as he detached himself from the box, and Alex now looked like a kicked puppy. The Doctor however held up a hand, index finger raised, silencing him pre-emptively, obviously not in the least affected by puppy-ness.

"I only have _one_ question: Why did you put a delay on the message?"

There was a moment's silence before Alex replied. A moment in which he avoided the Doctor’s eyes as hard as he could.

"I didn't want you to catch them."

Without moving a muscle the Doctor’s face abruptly changed, and when Alex looked up it was the Doctor who lowered his eyes.

Then he gently, almost apologetically, pulled Alex into a hug, and Josh thought that he heard a definitely wobble in his voice as he said:

“That's my boy."

And for the first time since they’d woken up on the Glattian ship Alex visibly relaxed, as he leaned into his uncle with a deep sigh.

"But," the Doctor continued, pulling back, "next time - have a little faith. I let them go - sent all their 'study subjects' home, of course, _and_ reported them to the Shadow Proclamation - Glattis is going to be under _very_ strict surveillance from now on. But I let them go."

Alex smiled then, bright and happy, and Josh noticed a small surprised noise from Jack, who was now standing shortly behind him. Ignoring him, the Doctor got a secretive look on his face.

"Did bring back a little souvenir though..."

With a flourish he pulled out a see-through bubble, within which was the weird little red spider thing. Alex's jaw dropped and then he excitedly reached out.

"The Rachnoss! Can I have it? Really? Thank you, Uncle, thank you, thank you, thank you!"

He hugged the Doctor vigorously, and then spun around, beaming.

"Look!"

Josh still thought that a _pretty_ alien would be far more interesting, but Matt - always curious about biology - seemed to be impressed enough for both of them, before they were all momentarily distracted from their excitement by the Doctor clearing his throat.

"Remember that we might still have to destroy it - it’s only a temporary educational tool."

Alex nodded distractedly and then eagerly began to fill both Matt and Josh in on Rachnoss history and physiology. Josh sighed and half-turned to catch Jack’s eyes, and Jack winked at him. Hang on - what was it Alex had said about Jack being able to introduce him to pretty aliens?

A new world, a bigger, wider, more extraordinary world was beginning to unfold around him... He was standing in the elusive Torchwood, alien technology all around him, housed in what looked like Victorian architecture - excitement and adventure surely lay just around the corner. Josh smiled at Jack and thought that despite everything the night had been brilliant.

Then Saxon's voice cut through the happy excitement.

"I hate having to repeat myself... But vengeance really is best served hot!"

Turning to locate the voice, Josh, along with everyone else, saw that Saxon was standing by one of the Torchwood computers, the flickering glow making his eyes dance wickedly, as he with infinite relish and great care let his hand fall to press a key on the keyboard.

For a second everyone appeared frozen in place, and then the Doctor and Jack surged forward, pushing Saxon out of the way.

Jack started scanning the screen as the Doctor, desperate, yelled at Saxon, nearly shaking him.

“What did you do? Master - what did you _do_?”

Taking his eyes off the unfolding drama Josh turned his head, and saw that Alex hadn’t moved at all, seemingly caught between bitterness and resignation.

“Told you so,” he finally said, so quietly that Josh wasn’t sure if he was just talking to himself. Before he could ask, his attention was caught by Jack, who had by now managed to unlock whatever secrets the computer held.

"How the _hell_ did you use that weapon? The codes are changed daily!"

Saxon sneered, disdainful and condescending.

"Minister of Defence? I created the whole _system_. Plus those codes are so simplistic a child of three could work them out!"

"But - how did the Glattians get back into Earth’s orbit?" the Doctor asked, furious and confused, and Saxon smiled superiorly.

"Overrode and programmed their navigation while _you_ were busy telling them off."

The Doctor’s jaw dropped, as Matt turned to Alex.

“What just happened?”

Alex, tiredly, dragged a hand across his face.

"Torchwood has... _weapons_. Alien weapons, adapted to protect the planet. Some of them powerful enough to blast spaceships out of the sky. Can’t believe none of us thought of that..."

His voice trailed off as he refocussed on the escalating argument in front of them, and Josh began to feel pinpricks on unease as the reality of the situation hit him, Alex’s words ringing in his ears...

_’You don’t understand. These guys **stole** me, and my dad... God, you have no idea. He’s going to **slaughter** them...’_

He’d thought his friend’s desperation somewhat... bizarre at the time, given their situation, but seeing it all happen just the way Alex had said it would...

Swallowing, he studied Saxon who was now speaking, coldly furious.

"I told you Doctor - _no one_ lays a finger on my boy, and lives. _That_ is final."

Tilting his head, a frosty, challenging smile touched Saxon's mouth.

"So, what are you going to do? Lock me up with the Family of Blood?"

He held out his hands, mockingly, as the Doctor stared back silently.

"Who's the Family of Blood?" Alex cut in, his quiet voice shattering the mutual glaring, and the two men - no, the two _aliens_ \- turned their heads, the Doctor’s expression unreadable.

“No one important,” he finally said, but the smirk on Saxon’s face gave lie to the words.

“Oh _Doctor_. Afraid that the boy is going to rattle that cupboard of yours and all the skeletons will come tumbling out?”

“Don’t-” the Doctor started, and Saxon laughed.

“Please, give him _some_ credit - I’m sure he’s perfectly well aware that if we started comparing our records on genocide you’d be _way_ ahead...”

The Doctor’s glare was pure fury, but - he didn’t retaliate.

For a second Josh felt like he couldn’t breathe, as the words with one fatal stroke flipped the whole night’s events upside down.

_'Tell me young Seeker, is it true was said of the Timelords? That they had the power of gods?’_

_'Don’t know about the power of **gods**... Although from **your** point of view I suppose that’s not entirely inaccurate.'_

He watched Saxon raise a smug eyebrow at the silenced Doctor, eyes trailing over the others dismissively.

“Well if you’re not going to do anything...”

The power of gods... The power to destroy a ship with a single keystroke. The power to - what? Alex’s words, that he had so recently scoffed at, came back to him once more.

_‘When I was born my father ruled the world and was just about to unleash war on the whole universe...’_

‘No wonder he never told us’, Josh thought to himself. ‘He must how this will affect us. Affect _me_...’

Saxon shrugged and turned away from the Doctor, and Josh instinctively moved away from the path he might take. Alex’s father, however, didn’t even notice, instead making a point of catching Jack’s eyes.

“Funny thing, but murder always makes me _incredibly_ thirsty. But I’m sure you remember that?”

He laughed, and Josh saw Jack swallow involuntarily. Saxon continued unaffected.

“I don't suppose that brave little teaboy of yours is here? Or is it too early? Well, I guess I'll make do with whatever you can rustle up."

Jack bristled. "Newsflash Master: Truce over. And I have a sudden overwhelming urge to lock you up with the weevils."

Saxon looked over his shoulder at the Doctor.

"He's terribly rude, you know. Can we go now? Leave him behind here for a century or two? It worked very nicely last time."

The Doctor seemed to have regained his equilibrium by now, and his voice was low and dangerous when he started speaking.

"Master..."

Alex was watching the scene with a deep weariness, before turning to Matt and Josh.

"Welcome to my life. Arguments daily at 10, 3 and 7, death-threats around midnight."

He sighed, and then turned the Rachnoss over in his hands.

"Still... there are... upsides, I suppose...”

Josh didn’t say anything, not yet knowing how to voice the absolute dread the word ‘genocide’ had woken in him. His grandmother still had her Kindertransport manila tag, and his family history consisted of a tree where all branches save one had been cut off...

All he wanted was to leave this place and the scary aliens. (He’d known Alex’s uncle most of his life. He didn’t know how to ever look at him again.) He wanted _solace_. He wanted to lose himself in someone’s (anyone's) arms, for soothing kisses to chase away unbidden, frightening truths. He wanted... He wanted things he couldn't have right now.

Then Alex - and Josh _really_ didn’t know how to deal with Alex right now - smiled a swift, barely-there smile.

“I promised I’d explain, didn’t I? Well let me show you something that’ll explain almost everything, without me having to say a word.”

Oblivious to the shouting match going on around them, he walked over to the blue police box, Matt and Josh trailing after him.

"This is the only piece left of Gallifrey, the long gone home of the Timelords. It's a TARDIS, which stands for ‘Time And Relative Dimension In Space’."

Josh frowned, grateful for the diversion. " _Relative_ Dimension?"

“Relative Dimension,” Alex repeated and opened the door. “Go on, have a look, and you’ll see why I’m worth dying for.”

The mixture of pride and bitterness in his voice didn’t go unnoticed, and Josh, with a cautious nod, stepped over the threshold and into... impossibility.


	7. Chapter 5

The Seeker couldn’t sleep.

From a linear point of view it was morning now, but he knew that his mind was far too crowded to calm down for a long, long time, so he didn’t even bother trying.

_(People **dead** , because of him. That had never happened outside a paradox before...)_

He’d finally gotten his friends settled - the two of them had barely been capable of walking straight by the end of the TARDIS tour, but there had still been endless questions that the Seeker had done his best to answer. Mostly from Matt, though... Josh had taken it all in, but he’d generally kept his queries focussed on technical questions about time travel, or how the TARDIS structure reflected Gallifreyan architecture, until finally he asked the question that had obviously been bothering him all along.

“Alex... Just how... how many races has your uncle killed?”

The Seeker had stopped, doing his best to look Josh straight in the eye, and trying very hard not think about strangling his father for bringing up that particular subject.

“Many. Including his own.”

For a moment his friends had just stood there, disbelieving, and the Seeker had continued, praying that the chasm wasn’t unbridgeable.

“He’s not even my real uncle. He just happens to be the only other member of my species still in existence, apart from my father.”

“How-” Josh’s words seemed stuck in his throat, and the Seeker had sighed.

“I told you there was a war. The last Great Time War, with the fate of the universe itself in the balance. Imagine... imagine that the Second World War had gone very differently, and Churchill had discovered that the only way to win would be to destroy England. And then he, himself, somehow survived, having to live with the choice he made. That’s the Doctor.”

Before Josh had a chance to reply, he’d held up a hand.

“Can we leave it at that for now? Please? If you want to hate someone, hate my Dad. He deserves it.”

Josh had nodded then, eyes thoughtful, and the Seeker had decided that finding bedrooms was probably a good idea. He needed peace and quiet to process everything...

_(He’d **known** how it would end, had foreseen perfectly how everyone would react, and yet - and yet his father’s murder was weighing on him in ways he hadn’t imagined.)_

Getting uncle and Dad to come to bed had been trickier, but he’d pointed out that it was nearing morning and the Torchwood staff would appear soon and with a bit of cajoling and a fair bit of _leaning_ had managed to get them to agree to some sleep. ‘Getting his own way’ being more a question of necessity than of want, for once.

So, what next?

Jack.

Sticking his head out of the TARDIS door, he saw Jack busy with something-or-other, and called out that he was going to take the TARDIS home to his mother’s, and would be making some breakfast in not too long if Jack wanted some?

Jack made a noncommittal noise, and the Seeker said “ _Please_ , Jack?” and then Jack nodded.

The Seeker would probably have been ashamed of his blatant manipulation if he hadn’t been so set on his goal. All he wanted was everyone getting together for breakfast, for them to be civil and _not yelling_ at each other. They owed him that much at least.

However, breakfast was still a good way off on his itinerary. Closing the door he - making sure to set the TARDIS engines to ‘silent’ - with great care took the time machine out to the vortex, and parked. Time out, literally, was what he needed right now.

Making his way down to his own set of rooms, thoughts kept crowding his mind, and he wasn’t quite sure how to deal with them. Because if he took his mind off the dead (the surgeon had been _brilliant_ , killing was always such a _waste_. Plus, now he'd _never_ find out where the Rachnoss had come from. Stupid, homicidal Dad!), other things intruded...

He’d been so _angry._

Never had he lost his temperament like that - well not since he was six, and he’d thought that rage gone, along with other so many other childish remnants. Just one more thing taken by the Schism, and one he had been grateful to lose. Except not... It had only laid dormant, and he had in that moment been ready to unleash fury he’d not thought himself capable of.

 _Damn_ Dad for seeing it. And doubly damn Dad for making him own up to it.

_(“...tell me one thing. And be honest. Did you want to kill them?”)_

Maybe, he thought to himself, maybe this was why the Doctor never carried weapons. It was far too easy to overreact, and then there was no way back...

At least he knew now. And forewarned was forearmed.

'I really am just like Spock', he thought wryly. 'I wonder, if I’d grown up on Gallifrey, if I’d have gotten into lots of fights...' Shaking his head, he couldn’t help chuckling to himself. He was the Master’s son, he’d have been even more notorious than he was here on Earth.

He’d reached his lab, and began looking through drawers and boxes to find the materials he needed. It was ridiculous - especially considering that he was in a dimensionally transcendent time machine - but he was forever cramped in here, even as the TARDIS kept giving him more space...

But never mind. For now there was work. Blissful, complicated work, that would hopefully help quell the voices in his head, and the still far too tender emotions.

_(“Lord Seeker...”)_

_Lord_. No one had ever done that before, addressed him with the proper honorific, like an adult, like an equal... He tasted the words a few times, let them settle in his mind, feeling the weight, the shape, the feel - _Lord_ Seeker.

Even as he couldn’t stop the well of undiluted pleasure that the words inspired, he began wondering how his father known that _respect_ was the one thing he had craved more than anything else? Was he truly his father’s son to such an extent?

Sighing, he forced himself to focus.

Stop thinking. Work. Take what you’ve discovered, project it forward, learn from it, _use_ it. Don’t be caught out again.

***

  


A long time later, he was rewarded for his hard work with a most beautiful and clever piece of technology. It would have been quicker if he’d had a screwdriver, but never mind. Slow and steady suited him just fine right now - especially since he’d been working from theoretical knowledge only.

Clutching his prize in the palm of his hand he hastened back to the control room and with utmost care piloted the TARDIS to his mother’s house, a few hours before sunrise.

Stepping out into the darkened garden he realised, with a moment’s despair, that he’d parked in the middle of his mother’s favourite flower bed. But since there was nothing he could do about it at the moment, he dismissed it from his mind.

Then, hearts beating, he programmed his little device, and - a fraction of a second later - stood in the middle of his own bedroom. Smiling triumphantly, he immediately made for his box of ‘heirlooms’ and extracted a pendant that had once belonged to his maternal grandmother. He’d always liked it, on account of the ornate ‘S’ that was engraved on the front (his grandmother’s name had been Susan), since the ‘S’ could equally well go with either Saxon or Seeker. Opening it, he looked at the miniature photos where his grandparents, the Lord and Lady Cole, smiled stiffly at him. He was looking forward to meeting them one day, although it’d be a while still - he’d have to wait until he had a different face.

Focussing once more on the task before him, he carefully examined the structure of the locket, and then smiled triumphantly. Oh it would work! Presuming he didn’t completely screw up of course.

He almost went straight back to the TARDIS, but catching sight of himself in the mirror decided that getting dressed might be a good idea. T-shirt, jeans, sandals - yeah, that would do. Tossing the pyjamas into the washing basket, he tried his best to suppress the memories of where they’d been.

Teleporting back to the garden he once more took the TARDIS into the vortex, unsure how long this next part would take. The teleporter wasn’t _that_ much bigger than the locket, but it’d still be tricky to make the locket dimensionally transcendental... But if the Doctor could do it with his pockets, then it _had_ to be possible.

First of all he needed to make a gap between one of the photos and the back of the locket, which was fiddly, but straightforward. The tricky part came next. After carefully re-reading the relevant parts of the TARDIS database he set forth, with a great deal of frustrating trial and error, before he suddenly managed to add about an inch of depth.

Staring dumbfounded at what he’d done, a swell of pure joy rushed through him, and, with hands that were only trembling a _tiny_ bit, he with great care inserted the teleport, making sure to seal it in very thoroughly. Then he folded his grandfather’s oval photo back to cover the controls (a small magnet to keep it in place maybe?) then closed the locket and surveyed it proudly.

A few moments swift search yielded a strong chain, and he then slipped it over his head, feeling the gentle weight settle on his chest over his rapidly beating hearts. He’d done it. He’d truly done it, and all by himself! _Why_ did people spend so much time fighting when they could learn and create instead? It was bewildering.

After taking a moment to bask in his accomplishment, he told himself to get back to business. What next?

Going through the itinerary in his head he hit on ‘camping stuff’ and carefully navigated to the little Welsh valley where their bright orangey yellow tent still stood, taking care to hit sunrise so he could actually see what he was doing. It took him a while to take down the tent and pack everything up, but finally he could dump it all inside the TARDIS door (someone else could tidy up later), and then set off back home again - once more hitting that same spot in the middle of the flower bed. Studying the scene in the light of the morning sun, he began to let the situation sink in:

Mum was going to _kill_ him.

Well, once she woke up.

Letting himself in through the patio doors, he looked through the fridge and cabinets which were under-stocked for his purposes, then - checking the clock on the wall - happily noted that the corner shop would already be open and set off to purchase enough provisions to feed a small army. He’d hopefully have time to make waffles before Mum noticed what he’d done to her roses...

It was a beautiful summer morning, and walking along he waved to a few neighbours who were setting off for work. The calm, quiet normality of it all was balm to his still restless mind - he knew what part to play here, knew who they saw and what he was. The Doctor always revelled in the ordinary-ness of human life, but the Seeker knew that the key lay in not thinking about it; to just _be_. Except last night his two worlds had collided and he’d yet to regain his equilibrium...

_(No one would ever know about the night’s slaughter. He wondered when the Glattians’ families would find out that their loved ones were dead...)_

The girl in the shop asked whether he’d had to come home early from his camping trip and by the way, how was that friend of his doing - Josh was it?

Going back home - mindful of the eggs in his shopping bag - the Seeker mused how curiously focussed on sex humans were. No wonder they managed to last until the end of time, considering their preoccupation with procreation. Although the way humans were ruled by their bodies was one of the things he knew he’d never quite understand - and, if he was honest, something he didn’t _want_ to understand. It was bad enough that his emotions had overriden his mind (something he never wanted to experience again), the idea of his _body_ doing the same was truly the stuff of nightmares.

_(Control, anticipation and self-knowledge were the key words. Be self-aware enough to know when you might be emotionally compromised...)_

Once more in the kitchen he began making waffle batter and put the kettle on, and after a while - as if called by the magic of waffles - Josh and Matt appeared from the TARDIS, looking a bit unsure as they made their way through the garden, but having obviously made use of the TARDIS wardrobe. Matt had found a T-shirt and some cargo trousers, and Josh looked even more stunning than usual in a gold brocade shirt and a pair of jeans that looked too tight to be in any way comfortable.

The Seeker opened the door wide.

“Come in! Breakfast is nearly served.”

His mother appeared at that moment, giving him a happy hug and a kiss, unsurprised to see him suddenly home. She knew how their life could take unexpected turns.

As the Seeker began setting out plates, Josh slowly shook his head, and the Seeker realised that - gold brocade or not - it would take a long time to mend last night’s damage.

“So,” Josh said, studying him, eyes unsure, “is this it? Last night we get abducted, and now we have _waffles_? Is that how it works?”

The Seeker looked back.

“Yes, that’s how it works. Waffles are nice.”

Before he could try to explain further, he heard his mother’s exclamation, and belatedly realised that he’d not filled her in on the night’s... happenings.

“You were _abducted_?” she asked, eyes wide, and the Seeker tried to project as much calm as he was capable of.

“Yes, but we are fine, look at us. The Doctor and Dad and Jack came and saved us and nothing bad happened to us _at all_. The only thing that’s different is that now Matt and Josh know about me.”

Just then - as if on cue - Jack materialised, and the Seeker smiled. Someone to back his story up.

Turning to his mother he saw her brow draw together, and swiftly added:

“It wasn’t anyone’s _fault - especially_ not Jack’s. It was just a bunch of Glattians, they’re very curious and they’d abducted lots of different people from different worlds.”

His mother stood very still for a moment, then said “Very well dear,” in a tone of voice that meant she was only saving the argument for later. Which was probably good, all things considered.

Matt, never one to waste an opportunity, was taking to the waffles with alacrity, but Josh still looked unconvinced, even as Jack sat down and helped himself.

“Listen,” the Seeker tried again, catching Josh’s eyes, “brooding doesn’t help, OK? Oh, actually-” he felt in his pocket for the slip of paper he’d tucked in earlier, “if you need something more than waffles, the girl in the shop gave me her number to give to you. I’m sure you remember her? Dimples, black hair? She’s off to uni at the end of the holidays, but her boyfriend broke up with her and she wouldn’t mind some TLC...”

He held out the paper, and after a moment Josh took it from his hands, eyes still serious, but now holding a spark of understanding.

“Thank you,” he said, and the Seeker tried smiling.

“Nothing we can do can bring those that died back to life. But waffles are nice. Waffles are _good_. Waffles will _always_ be good, no matter what.”

It was then that his mother noticed the TARDIS.

Her hand flew to her moth in mute horror, then she turned to him, eyes full of disappointment and hurt.

“Alexander! My roses!”

He busied himself with getting hot waffles onto plates.

“It was an accident. I’ll get you new ones! Special ones, from the Hanging Gardens of Babylon-”

“No,” she cut in. “Those were _special_. Mother planted them when I was born - they’re _irreplaceable!”_

“I’m sorry...”

She slowly shook her head, eyes narrowing.

“No Alexander. Being sorry isn’t good enough. You need to take responsibility for your actions - _fix_ it.”

A second later he worked out what she meant, and sighed deeply.

“Jack. Wrist strap please.”

Jack opened his mouth, shut it again, and then handed the wrist strap over. Sighing deeply, the Seeker trudged out the door, grabbing the shed keys in the process - although if he was honest, there was a certain relief in being able to fix _something_.

Carefully programming the vortex manipulator to take him back to 2am he found himself in the dead of night, as silently as possible unlocking the shed and retrieving a spade and some large flowerpots.

Digging up the rose bushes - now and again glancing up at the darkened windows - he contemplated what his mother would say when she found out what exactly had happened last night (well this night)... not a comforting thought. He knew that more than anything she would be _appalled_ at his behaviour - one did not yell at people, nor did one insult them with cheap and tacky remarks. He was _better_ than that, and he had most certainly been _brought up_ better than that. Plus she would ask him why on earth he had not immediately revealed who he was and ordered the Glattians to return him...

The outcome would of course have been the same in the end, but he’d not have compromised his dignity. And rudeness, in his mother’s world, was near unforgivable.

Having dug up and transferred the roses in question, he carefully carried them down to the bottom of the garden where no one would be able to spy them. Then he locked up the shed again, before returning to the morning, leaving just a few seconds’ break.

“They’re at the bottom of the garden,” he said to his mum when he came back in, and she smiled.

“Thank you.”

He handed the wrist strap back, and then noticed Dad and Uncle stepping out of the TARDIS. Dad, smiling widely, exclaimed “Waffles!” with great joy as he walked through the patio doors, but the Doctor still looked a bit under the weather.

However, before the Doctor could even say ‘Goodmorning’, Mum stepped forward and slapped him so hard that he nearly lost his footing.

Staring at her, hurt and confused, he naturally asked, “What was that for?” bringing up a hand to his hurting cheek.

“Alexander was abducted,” she replied coldly.

His eyebrows went skyward.

“And that is _my_ fault?”

“ _Everything_ is your fault,” she said bluntly, and the Seeker felt like banging his head against the wall. Mum was on the warpath and now everyone would fight again...

“You didn’t even _tell_ me! And now those aliens are out there, knowing about him and we will _never_ be safe! Not that we were before...”

The Doctor opened his mouth, but - as always with Mum - found that he didn’t really have anywhere to attack.

“Hey, shhhh,” Dad said, a gentle smile on his face as he pulled Mum into his arms, “Didn’t they tell you? I killed them.”

She lifted her head, blinking away the tears she’d been fighting, her face lighting up.

“Really?”

“Of course, my darling.”

The Seeker looked away and saw that the Doctor’s face was once more that hurt, angry mask, and then his eyes moved onto his friends who were watching, clearly not sure how to react. Stepping forward with more waffles, he tried to affect nonchalance.

“Remember what I told you? Evil parents.”

Matt nodded, but Josh didn’t seem that keen on accepting the weirdness. Damn. Although on the plus side it might help him focus on Dad as the one to hate...

“OK, can everyone sit down and eat please?” he said loudly, pouring tea into cups and thinking that he should probably boil another kettle.

“But I’ve not properly greeted your little human friends,” Dad said, walking round the table holding out his hand, that polite smile on his face that always came across as courteous disdain.

“It’s Matt and Josh, isn’t it? You may call me Mr Saxon or Master as you please.”

Matt took his hand as if in a daze, but Josh - going pale, but looking determined - shook his head and folded his arms.

Eyes narrowing, Dad tilted his head.

“Oh, you’re Jack’s little project, aren’t you?”

He turned to Jack, brightly insincere.

“You must be so proud!”

“ _Dad!”_ the Seeker said, exasperated. “ _Please_ will you just sit down. And _stop_ it.”

Dad pulled his best ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about’ face, but the Seeker just scowled and pointed at a chair.

Why was it always _him_ who had to make everyone behave?

‘Because I am the only one they all care about’, his mind filled in. How he longed to just get _away_... Somewhere - anywhere - a place of his own. Which wouldn’t happen for about a century at least, the way everyone was so desperate to protect him.)

At least they all ate their breakfast as they’d been told to, and the Seeker remembered that he needed to make more tea. But as he turned the kettle on, he heard his mother speak, and glanced over his shoulder, hearts sinking.

“And next time Doctor? What then?”

The Doctor, tea cup halfway to his mouth, faltered, and Dad smiled smugly.

“Anyone harms the boy, they die. Those are the rules now.”

“I should come with a warning - danger of death, do not touch,” the Seeker said to the teapot, trying not to sound too bitter, and he could feel both Jack and the Doctor freezing.

“Seeker,” the Doctor said softly, “it wasn’t your fault.”

Setting the teapot down on the worktop, he carefully turned.

“I _know_ that. Please just eat.”

“If you ever need to talk,” Jack began and the Seeker, frustrated, tried counting to ten, and then took in the whole table with an angry sweep of his eyes.

“I don’t need to talk about what happened, OK? The facts are these: The Glattians are one-track-minded magpies, and Dad is an overprotective psychopath. Add those two up, with me in the middle, and the only possible outcome is that the Glattians die. I saw that _from the first moment_ we woke up on that ship. It’s like... 2 plus 2 always makes 4. The _only_ way of dealing with it is to remove _me_ from the equation - which I can now do, no matter the situation!”

Pulling the pendant out from under his T-shirt, he held it up.

“I made myself a teleport.”

“Mother’s locket,” Mum said, surprised, and the Seeker pulled the chain over his head and let it dangle from his fingers.

“Here, have a look.”

The Doctor reacted first, jumping up and snatching it out of his hands, and mere moments later was studying the modified insides.

“How- when-”

”While you were sleeping,” he smiled, and the Doctor shot him a look that was a thinly disguised warning. Then his father leaned over, raising appreciative eyebrows, and the Seeker tried not to preen too much.

“Works perfectly by the way,” he said, and the Doctor’s head snapped up.

“You tried it?”

“Well _of course_ I tried it. How else would I test that it worked? Although I fixed Jack’s vortex manipulator _three years ago_ , so it’s not like I didn’t know what I was doing...”

(He ought to be ashamed of how easy lying came to him, but there were some things he was not ready to confess - the role his father’s screwdriver had played in fixing Jack’s wrist strap at the top of the list.)

“Yeah - we’ll have to have a talk about that,” Uncle said ominously, but the Seeker wasn’t too worried. Jack would be able to reel off a long list of times when a working teleport had saved the day, and he _had_ done all the theoretical work.

“No wonder you think school is boring,” Matt said quietly, and the Seeker shrugged.

“Pretty much any school would be. And after I’ve done my A-Levels I’ll be free to go do something of my own...”

A wistful note snuck into his voice, but he couldn’t help it. But at his words, his father suddenly looked up.

“Ah yes, that reminds me. You know I promised you something special, something magnificent as a reward for last night?”

The Seeker nodded cautiously, unsure where his father was going with this.

“Well son, after some consideration I came to a decision.” He paused for effect, enjoying the sudden nervous, but rapt, attention of the whole table.

“I think it’s time you got your own planet!”

The Seeker stared at his father as the beautifully impossible words slowly made their way through his head. His own planet. _His own planet._ His own- Strange how tight his chest suddenly felt and why was the world fuzzy around the edges...

He woke up on the sofa, his mother by his side and the Doctor and Dad hovering behind her nervously. And somewhere behind them were Jack and Josh and Matt.

“Wha- what happened?” he asked slowly, and Mum smiled.

“You fainted darling. How long has it been since you had anything to eat?”

“I... dunno.”

“But you made waffles for everyone else - didn’t it cross your mind to have one yourself?”

“I... just wanted everyone to be happy and not fight. Again.”

The Doctor looked guilty and Dad looked concerned, but then, all in a flash, the context came back to him. Abruptly he sat up, staring at his father.

“A planet? Really?”

“Absolutely.”

Turning to the Doctor the Seeker had to forcibly stop himself from reaching out and shaking him.

“Can I? Doctor, can I? Pretty pretty pretty please can I? You know how I keep cluttering up the TARDIS and how it would so much better if I could learn hands-on rather than just with theory? Just imagine the stuff you could teach me... Please please _please_?”

The Doctor looked slightly stunned, and behind him Josh snorted and lifted an eyebrow.

“A planet?”

The Seeker shot him as droll a look as he could manage, but probably ended up looking pathetically excited instead. Not that he minded right now.

“Not an _inhabited_ one, you moron. Just some out of the way lump of rock that I can do with as I please. Terraforming first of course, and then... oh the things I could do... Uncle please please _please_?”

“I... suppose it could prove a very educational project,” the Doctor finally conceded, and the Seeker leapt up from the sofa and hugged both Timelords as hard as he could.

“Thank you thank you _thank_ you! I promise I’ll be extra-super-specially responsible!”

_(And he could, he noted at the back of his mind, maybe do a study on Glattians, to see why they’d developed in such a suicidal fashion. It wasn’t natural. Maybe someone had been messing around with their DNA...)_

A little while later he was sat at the table happily eating waffles, not quite following the conversations around him - the Doctor had suggested to Matt and Josh that maybe they could continue their summer holidays by travelling with him, and the possibilities this opened up were beginning to make a proper impact on them, Josh having decided that he wanted to see the Seven Ancient Wonders of the World, and Matt being torn between about fifty different ideas. The Seeker’s mind however was busy trying to map all the most likely solar systems to hold possible planets - not too out of the way, and yet not easy to stumble across...

“Already planning, dear?” his mother asked (she knew the faraway look in his eyes far too well) and he waved his hands in joyful frustration.

“I don’t know yet - too many possibilities.”

“You could always make a clone army...” his father said lightly, as he reached for the jam, and the Seeker tried not to roll his eyes too hard.

”And what would I need a clone army for?”

“Cloning is always interesting,” his father shot back, with that smug smile that was perfectly annoying and yet irresistible, and the Seeker had to admit that he had a point.

“Well there _is_ that...”

”You’re not allowed to clone anything sentient!” the Doctor said authoritatively around a mouthful of waffle, and the Seeker sighed. Figured. (He tried his best to ignore the look Matt and Josh shot each other. He was moving further and further away...)

Then he bit his lip, struck by a thought.

“I guess I still have to do my A-Levels?”

The Doctor nodded slowly.

“I think so, yes. These are years that won’t ever come back, remember. But - as long as you keep up with your schoolwork, of course - I think you can certainly work on the planet on the side. The time management alone will be good for you.”

The Seeker nodded, eyes bright, and feeling that his hearts might actually burst if he tried to speak again.

Two years would be ample time to find and prime a planet, ready for habitation and the starting of projects, and then - once his friends set off for university - he’d be eighteen and independent. No more lies, no more pretending, just the freedom to be himself, and to create his own world.

Eight years childhood, eight years basic teaching, and now this - a new cycle. His future started _here_ , rising from a night of death and painful truths... (Change was always painful, the Schism had taught him that.)

A future bright with promise, holding a burnt orange sky.


End file.
